How to Promote Your Fashion Blog

In the last Fashion Blog Friday I provided you with a list of writing prompts. I hope you’ve gotten a few things published! Now it is time to start promoting your new fashion or beauty blog. If you are wondering how to get traffic to your blog, here are some great ways to do it.

Social Media

Fashion and beauty blogs are highly visual. This means your site will likely get a lot of love from social media. Once you create a Page on the social platform, don’t forget to add the link to a social media widget and put it in your sidebar (most themes come with a social follow widget installed).

Don’t overwhelm yourself! Start with two or three social networks and focus your time and energy building up a strong following on those before experimenting with others. You likely have a few favorite platforms already.

Has to Have a Hashtag!

One of the hardest things for me to embrace online has been the use of hashtags. I get them. I search for them myself. They are always just an afterthought. However, the proper use of hashtags on Twitter, Instagram and Google+ can get your new fashion or beauty blog in front of the right people. Popular Fashion/Beauty Hashtags:

#bbloggers (Beauty Bloggers

#fbloggers (Fashion Bloggers)

#beauty

#fashion

#motd (Makeup of the Day)

#fotd (Face of the Day)

#ootd (Outfit of the Day)

Never use more than three at a time. Ever! And always take an extra minute before posting your new manicure on Instagram or product review on Twitter to hop over to the brand’s website and grab their handle to include in your post. Especially on Instagram, this may just get your update reposted by the brand.

Subscribers

It is not safe to build your blog following on social media alone. You need to provide a few alternatives that will guarantee a larger portion of your following is seeing your posts. I have had a lot of success with Bloglovin’. This is a RSS aggregator used by many that follow these industries. I also highly recommend building an email list ASAP. Mad Mimi offers a free account.

Fashion Blog Communities

There are some great communities out there for connecting with other bloggers and promoting your work. A few of my favorites:

You’ll want to follow proper forum etiquette (no spamming, only leave your links in the appropriate places). Read the rules prior to jumping in. Some of these places (ex. Lucky & PopSugar) allow bloggers to contribute original content to the site as well. Guest posting is always a great way to promote your blog. Others (ex. IFB & iFabbo) do weekly linkups to member blog posts.

SEO

Search Engine Optimization is always my favorite way to gain qualified traffic. Wordtracker’s Free Keyword tool can help you uncover a few phrases.

5 Easy Opportunities to Build a Blog Tribe

If you are looking to increase exposure to your blog quickly, a “tribe” is the way to go. If you are unfamiliar with the term, a tribe is basically a small group of bloggers in the same industry and with similar goals promoting each other’s work via social media. You Pin my post, I’ll Pin yours!

Group Pinterest Boardsare a great way to increase exposure. All pins added to the group board will be seen by each member’s followers, even if they are not following you personally. That being said, you may want to put some rules in place regarding what can be pinned and how often. You can also include these rules and your email address in the board description if you would like to open the opportunity to the public and allow them to contact you for an invitation.

Facebook Groups are great for small mastermind groups. If you know a few like-minded bloggers within your industry a Closed Group is a great place to drop blog posts for community sharing. (I prefer Closed Groups as this prevents group discussions from showing up in Friends’ Newsfeeds.) It’s also a great place for blog discussions and sharing resources. Again, rules are often needed to ensure everyone is giving as much as they expect to take.

Linkys are always popular if you can reach out to bloggers with a specific weekly or monthly theme. Just as recipe bloggers linkup their favorite slow cooker or dessert recipes, you could start an Outfit of the Week or Favorite Beauty Product Review linky. Linkups do best when highly publicized and regularly held.

Triberr is for those of us still in love with Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin. You can join an existing Tribe or start your own. While sharing and commenting are optional, most Tribes highly encourage a give-and-take atmosphere.

Google+ Communities are very similar to Facebook Groups. These can be public or private and also include the Hangout feature.

But why would I want to share someone else’s posts?

While many try to get into a tribe to take, take, take and never give, there are plenty of great reasons – beyond karma – to share other’s work with your readers. Namely, trust and authority. Your readers will come to trust you as an authority figure in your niche when you are keeping tabs on their industry of interest and sharing important and timely pieces with them. You will become their “go-to” for quality, trustworthy information.

Track Your Results

Your website stats or Google Analytics will tell you which sources are referring the most traffic allowing you to better focus your marketing efforts.

These are a few of my favorite ways to promote a fashion or beauty blog. What would you add?

Reader Interactions

Comments

I don’t fashion blog but wow! You have some very good resources here that fashion bloggers need to look into. ANd you made it so easy for them!! You pretty much gave them their marketing plan and all they need to do is click. I hope they see the awesome is this resource!

This is great info! I am trying to build traffic for my Pup Lifestyle Blog right now, which is similarly visual, since it largely includes pictures of my Chihuahua mix 🙂 I have had a lot of success with Instagram but am having a hard time breaking down the Pinterest walls–perhaps group boards are the answer! Bloglovin’ has been a great way to connect with fellow pup bloggers and has even built my Instagram following!

Hello there! There’re a lot of underwater rocks, if you use IG for your blog’s promotion. In other words, you can’t gain success organically without third party apps. For example, Zengram would be the best choice if you are looking for new followers, which should be active and interested. Secondly, management apps play a big part on the way to success. In any case, this list is so long )